Medical Issues
by ficwriterjet
Summary: Written in response to the following prompt: Walter is still experiencing symptoms from his accident but continues to work without telling Cabe. WARNING: Coerced spanking of an adult by his mentor.


**Author's Note:** This was written for the 'Spankvent 2015 Prompt Fest' over on the LiveJournal group 'spanking_world'. This is the result of the first prompt I picked.

 **Prompt:** Scorpion, Cabe/Walter, Set around 2x02 - Walter is still experiencing symptoms from his accident but continues to work without telling Cabe

 **Disclaimer:** I don't own any of these characters, and I'm not making any money from this story.

 **Warning:** Coerced spanking of an adult by his mentor.

MEDICAL ISSUES

It was late in the afternoon. The members of team Scorpion were all at their office filling Sylvester in about their most recent adventure, since he'd had an appointment that morning and missed all the excitement. Walter was happily relating how a piece from his hand brace had actually ended up saving the day when Cabe walked through the front door. The case they'd just finished was for a private firm, so the team hadn't seen the older man since early that morning when he'd checked in.

A chorus of cheerful greetings welcomed Cabe, but he didn't respond to any of them. Instead he kept his eyes on Walter, put his hands on his hips, and said, "Walter and I are gonna need the room."

Walter swallowed reflexively. He'd seen that look on Cabe before, and nothing good ever came from it, but he didn't know why the older man was upset.

Cabe turned to Toby, and said, "As a matter of fact, we're gonna need the whole building. How about you all call it a night."

Toby glanced at Walter. "Wow. I'm not sure what you did, but I'm so glad I'm not in your shoes right now."

Walter scowled at his unhelpful friend. He hadn't done anything.

"Why, what's going on?" Sylvester asked.

"Nothing that we want to witness my friend," Toby said. Then he raised his voice slightly and made eye contact with Happy and then Paige as he gestured towards the front door. "Come on, everyone, you heard the man. Let's call it a night. Walter doesn't want an audience right now."

Happy followed Toby so quickly she actually beat him to the door. Sylvester looked back and forth between Walter and Cabe a couple of times, and once Walter gave him a reassuring nod, he followed Toby and Happy out.

Instead of moving towards the door, Paige said, "Cabe, is everything okay?"

Cabe crossed his arms and turned to Walter with a raised eyebrow. "You wanna tell her what's going on?"

Walter's mind kept going over what he might have done, but nothing came to mind. Well one thing came to mind, but it was statistically improbable for Cabe to know about that. He smiled at Paige and said, "I'm sure it's nothing important. You should go home and spend some extra time with Ralph."

"Nothing important?" Cabe said loudly. He jabbed a finger in Walter's direction and said, "Your health is important to me, and it's important to the rest of the team."

Walter's eyebrows went up in shock, and his stomach lurched. Cabe _did_ know.

Paige easily guessed what Cabe was angry about. She narrowed her eyes and asked Walter, "Are you still having dizzy spells from your accident?"

Walter opened his mouth to speak, but before anything could come out Cabe said, "You'd better think long and hard about the next words that come out of your mouth, son. Because if I don't like what I hear, I'm not waiting for Paige to leave to start ripping you a new one."

Walter's eyes darted back and forth a couple of times between Cabe and Paige. They were wearing matching expressions of disappointment, so Walter turned his eyes to the ground and said, "There may have been a dizzy spell." Cabe put his hands on his hips again. "Or two," Walter added.

"And you hid it from all of us? Again?" Paige asked.

"Not mentioning it isn't the same as trying to hide it." Walter insisted.

"I see." She shook her head, and gave Cabe the same sympathetic expression that she generally gave to other parents when their children were acting up in public. "Well then, I guess you guys have a lot to talk about, so I'll get out of your hair." She grabbed her purse and said, "See you both tomorrow," as she headed out the door.

As soon as the door shut, Cabe said, "What did I say to you just a couple of days ago when you admitted you'd been hiding your medical issues from me?"

Walter knew very well what the older man had said, but he wasn't going to repeat the words back to him. When he'd come to work in the morning, the thought of Cabe finding out he was still having the occasional dizzy spell hadn't even crossed his mind. Now he really wished he'd considered that a possibility and formulated a contingency plan.

"How'd you find out?" Walter asked.

"Kid, I've known you since you were eleven. I know when to check in with your doctors, and I know what questions to ask. Did you really think you could hide it from me?"

That sure seemed like a rhetorical question to Walter, because clearly he had thought he could hide it, or he wouldn't have asked how Cabe had found out. Instead he said, "The doctors aren't allowed to release my information to you."

"I'm your boss. All I had to ask is whether or not you'd been cleared for work. I figured the rest out all on my own by glancing at your chart when the doc was distracted. Now answer my original question before I skip the lecture and move straight on to the punishment. What did I say about hiding your medical issues?"

Walter's eyes opened wide with surprise. "Uh… punishment? What do you mean punishment?"

With a sigh, Cabe shook his head. "It's always gotta be the hard way with you, doesn't it." He shrugged out of his suit jacket, and hung it on the back of Walter's desk chair. "You heard right, I said punishment." He pulled the gun out of his holster, and set it on the desk. "After you drove yourself off a cliff a few months ago, and almost died, I made you a promise." He unbuttoned one of his shirtsleeves and started rolling it up. "You happened to be unconscious at the time, but a promise is still a promise." He unbuttoned the other side, and rolled that sleeve up as well. "I promised that I would find a way to curb your self-destructive behavior by any means necessary, no matter how unpleasant both of us might find the process." He turned Walter's rolling desk chair around so it faced away from the desk, and sat down in it. "Wanna guess what method I'm going to try first? I'll give you a hint; it's the same way your dad helped curb your self-destructive hacking when you were eleven."

A sick feeling of dread pooled in Walter's stomach. He shook his head no, and backed up a step. He may not be great at picking up social cues, but he knew exactly what Cabe had in mind, because the man had witnessed Walter getting spanked when he was eleven. Cabe had been the one to drive him home after being detained for hacking NASA. His father had not been pleased.

"Don't be ridiculous. I'm not eleven. I'm a grown man."

"A grown man who's acting like an eleven-year-old," Cabe countered. "Mature adult men don't lie to their doctors, or hide their medical conditions from their friends and family, so that they can go back to work before they're physically ready."

Walter shook his head again, but didn't verbally deny Cabe's accusations.

"Wanna answer my original question now, or would you rather answer it while you're over my lap?"

Walter's initial worried expression slowly turned into a tiny vindicated smile as he found a loophole. "You said the next time I held out on you in regards to my health, we'd have an issue. But I didn't hold out on you. I only saw you for five minutes this morning, so technically I haven't had a chance to hold out on you. Given those circumstances, logic dictates that we don't have an issue."

Cabe's expression turned even grimmer as his eyes narrowed. He said with a dangerous calm, "Logic? Do you really think you can logic yourself out of this? How well did that work for you back when you were thirteen and I took you off that project for a week?"

The smile left Walter's face, and a small blush formed on his cheeks. That situation had not ended well for him, and he had a sinking feeling that this situation was going to end just as badly, if not worse.

"I asked you how you were doing this morning before you all went on that case, and you looked me in the eye and told me you were feeling good."

Walter shrugged, and said with some defiance, "I _was_ feeling good. I still am."

Cabe shook his head. "That's a load of bull. You knew I wasn't asking a generic question, I was asking about your health, and you lied about it. The doctors haven't released you yet, but here you are at work. As your boss, your friend, and your sometimes father figure, I'm telling you that we have an issue. You don't have to agree with me. In fact, you can strongly disagree with me, just like you did at thirteen. But either way the outcome is going to be the same. You _are_ getting punished."

Walter crossed his arms, and Cabe could swear he saw a pout before the younger man gave him a serious glare. "You can't force me over your lap the way my father could when I was eleven."

Cabe raised an eyebrow, clearly disagreeing.

"Legally I mean," Walter added. There was no doubt in either of their minds that Cabe could physically subdue him.

With a nod Cabe said, "You're right. But I was never going to force you. You're going to agree to it."

It was Walter's turn to raise an eyebrow in disagreement.

"You're going to come over here and go over my knee before I count to ten, or I'm going to bench you for three months."

Walter's eyes opened wide, and he lost the color in his face. "You wouldn't." The words had come out so softly, the older man almost couldn't hear them.

Cabe continued, "I would and I will, just like I did when you were thirteen. I'll make sure everyone on my government team and everyone on your team knows that you're not allowed to work for a full three months, and to report it to me immediately if they see or hear about you doing one iota of work for anyone."

Walter shook his head, but he absolutely believed that Cabe would follow though. "But… what if the team needs me?"

"Ten."

Scowling with frustration, Walter said, "If someone's life is on the line, I know you'll let me work to save them, which will negate this supposed punishment."

"Fair enough," Cabe said. "If someone's life is on the line, I'll let you work during those three months, but if that happens, then you get an extra month added to your punishment each time."

"What? But that's…"

"Nine."

"Cabe, be reasonable. Taking into account the number of times lives are on the line when we work, I could be benched for over a year."

"I'm fine with that. Eight."

Walter gestured wildly towards Cabe and said, "I don't understand what you think this will accomplish. I'm not eleven. The threat of a small amount of pain delivered by you onto my rear end in a systematic manner isn't frightening anymore."

"It's not about the pain, son, it's about your emotions, and fear isn't what I'm aiming for here. Seven."

"What are you aiming for?"

"Repentance, and a healthy dose of embarrassment to make you avoid this situation again in the future. Six."

Walter crossed his arms and glared down at the older man. "I'm already being punished by the courts. You don't need to add to it." 

"You know that's for a separate issue. The courts are punishing you for the initial act, which I fully support by the way. I'm punishing you for basically lying to me and to your friends. And I'm ninety-eight percent sure that Toby and Paige will be completely on board with my decision to bench you. Five."

Walter's jaw twitched as he clenched his teeth.

"Four." Cabe shook his head. "Three. You're quickly running out of options son, because once I get to one, negotiations are done, and you're benched. You need to ask yourself which option will be less frustrating and embarrassing, everyone on the team knowing that I've basically grounded you for three months, or just you and me knowing that I spanked you."

Walter's eyes darted away while he thought that over.

"Two."

"O…."

"Okay!" Walter cut off the older man before he could finish the word, and took five steps towards him. "I'll… I'll do it. I'll let you spank me." His face turned bright red.

Walter was still out of touching distance, so Cabe used his feet to roll the armless office chair closer. He took Walter's uninjured wrist in his hand and said, "Good choice, son." He patted his thigh. "Let's get this over with, and then I'm taking you back to the doc, where you were supposed to be this afternoon anyway, and you're going to be honest with him about all of your symptoms."

For the next few seconds, Walter just stood still staring down at Cabe's lap. Cabe took another look at Walter's injured hand in the brace, and said, "Hold up a second." He let go of Walter's good wrist, got up, and walked over to Toby's desk while Walter carefully watched his every move. Cabe grabbed Toby's office chair, and rolled it over so it was sitting directly beside Walter's office chair, creating a space for Walter to rest his upper body. He sat back down, patted the empty chair, and said, "Lean on this while you're over my lap. I don't want you hanging upside down if you're having dizzy spells, and you need a place to rest your injured hand anyway."

When Walter didn't make a move, Cabe said, "Dragging this out isn't going to make it go away, son. I'm not going to yank you down while you're injured, so you need to put yourself over my lap. No more stalling."

Walter opened and closed his mouth as if he was going to say something but changed his mind.

Cabe raised his voice slightly and barked out an order. "Get over my knee right now!"

Cringing, Walter put himself into the awkward position, resting his upper half on Toby's chair.

"Thank you, for not making this even more difficult." Cabe let his entire forearm rest against Walter's back with his hand on the younger man's hip to keep him securely in place. He rested his spanking hand on the center of Walter's behind and said, "You will _stop_ hiding your medical issues from me and from the team, and you'll start listening to your doctors, or we're going to be doing a lot more of this in the future." With that, he raised his hand, and started spanking.

Walter clenched his jaw, and refused to make a sound. The solid whacks were spaced less than a second apart and they fell in a frustratingly random pattern so that Walter couldn't predict where the next smack would land. Thirty seconds later Walter's entire rear end _stung_ , and he couldn't stop his body from twitching in reaction to each slap. How much longer was this supposed to last? His father had never hit him this many times during a spanking. He'd assumed this spanking would be longer and harder than any he'd received as a child, simply because he was an adult, but not knowing when it would end was unsettling.

Another ten painful smacks later, Walter grunted out the word, "Cabe?"

"Yeah, kid?"

The horrible slapping stopped, and Walter was able to scramble his thoughts together while taking a deep breath. "Don't you think that's enough?"

"Not even close," Cabe said with regret, and started spanking again.

"Ow!" The first slap caught him off guard, and he started to panic slightly. "Not even close?" Walter muttered, not believing that could be true. "But you've already made your point very clear. Ow Cabe! There's no need to keep going!"

"I disagree," Cabe said while increasing the force behind the swats. "I am fed up with your cavalier attitude towards your own health and safety, and I'm fed up with you hiding things from me, so I am not going to stop until I decide you've had enough."

"Ah!" The increased pain was awful. His entire body tensed with the effort to stay still, and he couldn't stop his legs from kicking a little with each smack. "Ow! I have had enough! Cabe! It's enough! I promise it's enough. I'll modify my behavior in the future!"

Cabe had to smile when he heard Walter's version of 'I'll be good,' but he kept his hand in motion. "That's good to hear. Tell me how you're going to modify your behavior."

"I'll… Ow! I'll take my recovery seriously! Ah! I'll follow the doctor's instructions! And… Ouch! I won't hide things from you!"

"I hope that's true, son," Cabe said while continuing the spanking

"It is!" Walter could feel his eyes fill with tears, and he whimpered. Getting spanked was already humiliating. Crying from it would only add to his shame. "Cabe, please! Please stop!"

"I'm not going to stop until I hear some kind of repentance or remorse out of you."

"I'm sorry!" The words immediately flew out of Walter's mouth. "Cabe! I'm sorry! Really, I am! Please believe me!"

Cabe landed two more harsh swats, and then stopped altogether. "Alright, son, I believe you." He patted Walter's back, and heard the younger man sniffle a couple of times. "We're all done here. You can get up." Walter sniffled again, wiped at his face with his good hand, and then pushed himself into a standing position.

Cabe stood as well, and put a hand on Walter's shoulder. He took in the red face, the slightly damp eyelashes, and the expression of sincere remorse, and pulled the kid into a tight hug. After a slight pause, Walter hugged him back.

"I don't want to do this ever again," Cabe said, "but I _will_ if you don't shape up."

"You won't have to. I swear." Walter said, trying to keep his voice level with difficulty. This was one experience that he _never_ wanted to repeat.

After a few seconds, Cabe patted the younger man's back once and let go. "Okay, time to go see the doctor, and do some confessing." Cabe tilted his head towards the front door and said, "Let's go."

Walter winced at the thought of what his doctor would have to say, and then pouted while rubbing his sore butt with his good hand. Sitting was not going to be easy anytime soon. "Right now? Could we maybe wait for fifteen minutes?"

Cabe thought about it for a few seconds, and decided he just couldn't be a hard ass anymore tonight. "Fifteen minutes, and then we go."

"Thanks."

The older man nodded, and put the chairs away while Walter waited for the pain to settle.

# # #

The next morning Cabe drove Walter to work. Once everyone had arrived Cabe gathered the team, and said, "Walter has something to tell you all."

Walter cleared his throat and tried not to blush with shame as he said, "My doctor says that while I'm recovering better than he expected, I'm still not ready to be out in the field unless it's an emergency."

"Which means?" Cabe prompted.

"Unless someone's life is on the line, I'll stay here in the office while you guys go into the field, and I'll help remotely when I can."

"That's a great solution," Paige said. "You'll still be able to work while you finish recovering."

"How long?" Cabe asked, even though he knew the answer.

"At least two weeks. I'll give you guys an update in two weeks, and let you know if anything has changed."

"Does this mean I'll have to go out more often?" Sylvester asked.

"It'll be good for you, kid," Cabe said to Sylvester. Then he put a hand on Walter's shoulder and said, "Tell them about your time constraints."

Walter scowled at Cabe, but the older man just raised an eyebrow and stared him down. Walter huffed and said, "Unless it's an emergency, I can only work for six hours a day to start with."

Cabe patted his shoulder, and looked around the room at the team. "Okay guys, we have a new case. The FBI called about an hour ago, and asked for our help."

Cabe spent the next several minutes explaining the case, and fifteen minutes later, Happy, Paige, and Sylvester left with Cabe, while Toby and Walter stayed behind to help them remotely from the office. Walter suspected that Cabe had really made Toby stay behind to keep an eye on him, but the older man had made the excuse sound legitimate.

Once they were alone, Toby looked Walter over and said, "Something happened."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Walter tried and failed not to sound worried.

"Yes you do. You deferred to Cabe again and again this morning." Toby shook his head. "That's not your normal dynamic. What did Cabe say to you last night?"

"I don't want to talk about this." Walter stalked over to his desk, and sat down gingerly with a wince.

"Oh my God!" Toby's eyes opened wide as he read his friend's nonverbal cues. "Did Cabe…" Toby caught himself in time, darted his eyes around the room even though he knew they were alone, and lowered his voice to a whisper, "Did Cabe _spank_ you?"

"What!" Walter shook his head vehemently. "No! Of course not. That's just… That's just ludicrous. I don't even know what…"

"He did!" Toby said with some awe, and then looked away and muttered to himself, "I would not have predicted that. I need to reevaluate him. A slap to the back of the head, a rough shake, or a stern lecture, sure, but a full on spanking? I wouldn't have thought so. But clearly it was serious if you're still too sore to sit comfortably." Toby turned back to Walter and noticed that his friend looked pissed. "What?"

"I didn't want anyone to know. You can't tell _anyone. Ever_ ," Walter said emphatically.

"Ah, I see. You're embarrassed." Toby nodded to himself as he scrutinized Walter. "That's a smart move on his part. And fitting considering he's a father figure in your eyes. I have to give Cabe more credit."

"Toby!" There was a hint of desperation in Walter's voice.

Toby was too busy thinking to pay much attention. He waved a hand at Walter in a shooing gesture while he walked to his own desk. "Yeah, yeah, I'm not telling anyone. Ever. I heard you."

Walter's shoulders slumped and he spent the next few minutes feeling sorry for himself. It was bad enough that Cabe knew, Toby knowing made it all worse. Then the computer binged, and the team was soon talking to him through the laptop asking for his help. He pushed his inconvenient and confusing emotions into the background, relieved to have a case to focus on. He knew he'd have to deal with his feelings at some point, but for now there was work to do, people to help, and a team that needed him.

The End


End file.
